Summary Information

Analyzing the Mass Shooting Data retrieved from http://www.shootingtracker.com/, a total of 340 shootings occured across the country in the given year, with a total of 373 lives lost and 1347 injured. The city that was most impacted by mass shootings (by measuring the total number of deaths and injuries within the city) is Chicago, with 135 reported victims (both dead or injured). The state with the most number of victims killed is California, with 50 victims reported dead. The state with the most number of victims wounded is Illinois, with 150 victims reported injured.

Summary Table

Sorts the whole dataset and groups it by states where mass shootings occured in the given year, providing a brief summary about the number of deaths, injuries, and total victims.

                  state Deaths Injuries Total_Victims
1               Alabama     12       55            67
2               Arizona      4        5             9
3              Arkansas      7       17            24
4            California     50      136           186
5              Colorado      9       27            36
6           Connecticut      0        8             8
7              Delaware      5        0             5
8  District of Columbia      2       23            25
9               Florida     48      132           180
10              Georgia      3       33            36
11             Illinois     21      150           171
12              Indiana     10       27            37
13               Kansas      1       11            12
14             Kentucky      7       25            32
15            Louisiana     15       50            65
16             Maryland     13       31            44
17        Massachusetts      0        4             4
18             Michigan     10       28            38
19            Minnesota      1       14            15
20          Mississippi      1       17            18
21             Missouri     12       52            64
22             Nebraska      1       16            17
23               Nevada      3       15            18
24           New Jersey      4       54            58
25           New Mexico      5        4             9
26             New York      5       53            58
27       North Carolina     14       37            51
28                 Ohio     13       46            59
29             Oklahoma      2       19            21
30         Pennsylvania     35       63            98
31       South Carolina      5       19            24
32            Tennessee     19       68            87
33                Texas     29       62            91
34                 Utah      0        4             4
35             Virginia      2       17            19
36           Washington      4        9            13
37            Wisconsin      1       16            17

Description of a Particular Incident

I decided to do some research on the “Thousand Oaks” incident that happened in California located at 99 Rolling Oaks Dr on November 7, 2018. There was a total number of 15 victims impacted from this incident, with 13 reported dead and 2 reported injured. According to The New York Times, “The shooting inside the bar, a favorite local hangout for 25 years that hosted line-dancing lessons and allowed students in starting at 18, and where on Wednesday night several college women were celebrating their 21st birthdays, began around 11 p.m. Witnesses described sudden chaos. Among the estimated 130 to 180 people at the bar were five off-duty police officers, enjoying the night like the other partyers. As patrons dove for cover, the sounds of glass shattering and gunshots rang out in the cavernous bar. The gunman prowled the emptying dance floor, shooting the wounded as they lay on the ground”. And as USA Today stated, “The incident was also the deadliest mass shooting in the U.S. in 2018 since 17 classmates and teachers were gunned down at a Parkland, Florida, school on Valentine’s Day”.

SOURCES

USA Today: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2018/11/08/thousand-oaks-california-bar-shooting-307th-mass-shooting/1928574002/

The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/08/us/shooting-california-thousand-oaks.html

Interactive Map

The purpose of including a map is to provide a better visual representation of where the mass shootings occured on the map accross the country in the given year.

From the interactive map, there were more mass shootings that happened on the East side of America in 2018. There were states that did not have any mass shootings reported at all in 2018 including Wyoming, Idaho, Montana and more, which a lot of these states are located on North side of America.

Plot

I chose to use a bar chart to present my findings collected from the data because it helps visualize which month in the given year has mass shootings that involved most victims, dead or injured. In the bar chart, it is clear that most victims were affected by mass shootings happened in June 2018, with a total of 257 victims. It is also pretty easy to see that there tends to be more victims involved in mass shootings in 2018 during the summertime (between Jun and Sep), as those 4 months all had more numbers of victims impacted from mass shootings.